Samsung’s Galaxy S9 could lose half its value within a month

If you’re anything like me, you won’t be ordering the Samsung Galaxy S9 straight after its launch at the end of this month. That’s not to check if it’s another exploding disaster like the Galaxy Note 7 (although that isn’t the worst idea) but because if you wait a few months, it’ll inevitably come down in price and you’ll be able to get yourself a bit of a bargain.

The other side of this coin, which I admit I’d rarely thought about because I never buy brand new phones, is how much money you can lose in terms of depreciation.

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Based on the depreciation patterns of the S5, S6, S7 and S8, musicMagpie has revealed that the S9 will likely lose a whopping 50% of its value in the first month alone. Samsung’s previous flagship device, the Galaxy S8, which had a retail price of £689, lost 49% of its value in the first month after launch, and then dropped by another 2-3% every month after that. By nine months old, it had lost 65% of its value.

If you want a new phone straight after launch, the best idea is, quite simply, to buy an iPhone. The iPhone 8 dropped in value by 30% in its first month, which is considerably lower than the 49% fall on the Samsung Galaxy S8.

Buy the iPhone 8 now from Currys

Liam Howley, marketing director at musicMagpie, said “Our recent phone depreciation study shows that iPhones hold their value better than Samsung devices, and while some technical difficulties have been reported for the iPhone X, the model still seems to hold its own over the Samsung models.”

“Our study has shown that it really does pay to not hold on to Samsung devices for too long, as they depreciate a lot faster.”

I’m being pedantic, but I disagree with the last point – selling the phone sooner doesn’t fix the problem. To solve the depreciation issue, you really have to wait until the device is old enough that its new value gets closer to its resale value. Personally, I’d probably buy it when its new value has fallen by more than 50% and then end up holding onto it forever after.

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Based on its findings, the company also recommends selling your old Samsung device now, ahead of the S9 launch, because you can receive 25% more compared to after a new model comes out. There’s clearly some truth in this, but I’d advise taking all the figures with a pinch of salt, because they’re based on a site that offers same-day payments for people eager to offload their handsets right away, even if it’s not at the best price.